Giants notes: Chris Stratton reacts to first big league promotion, Matt Cain lands on DL, Hunter Pence back in lineup but Bruce Bochy scratches another outfielder

Chris Stratton had a 6.02 ERA with Triple-A Sacramento, but impressed Giants coaches in the spring.

DENVER – Chris Stratton is a former SEC Pitcher of the Year from Mississippi State and grew up in Tupelo, which is a five-hour car ride from Atlanta or St. Louis.

“You’re either a Braves fan or a Cardinals fan,” he said. “Or an Elvis fan.”

Stratton might never eclipse Elvis Presley as Tupelo’s favorite son, or its famous honey as its best-known export. But that doesn’t really matter on the day you get called up to the big leagues for the first time.

The Giants placed right-hander Matt Cain on the 15-day disabled list prior to Saturday’s game, one day after he strained his right hamstring in the second inning of a start at Coors Field. Stratton is active and available to pitch in relief.

As nice a story as it would be for Stratton to make his major league debut with a start in Atlanta on Wednesday, he’s not here to take Cain’s spot in the rotation. If that were the case, they would’ve waited until Wednesday to put him on the roster.

Instead, Stratton is here to fill in for long reliever Albert Suarez, who will be unavailable for awhile after throwing five innings in relief of Cain Friday night. It’s Stratton’s good fortune that he happened to be the most rested Triple-A starter on the Giants’ 40-man roster.

With Madison Bumgarner and Johnny Cueto starting the final two games at Coors Field, it’s possible that Stratton could get a call-up without making an appearance, just as it happened to Clayton Blackburn earlier this month.

Stratton’s family is taking no chances. His parents, brother, sister, wife and 3-week-old son all began to make their way to Denver shortly after Stratton got word Friday night.

“It’s been kind of a whirlwind month,” said Stratton, who became a first-time dad on Mother’s Day when his wife, Martha Kate, gave birth to Christopher Mack.

Stratton has a pretty good call-up story, too. He got the news from Jose Alguacil after the Sacramento manager had been ejected for arguing the strike zone. Mac Williamson had been ejected and Alguacil came out to defend his player.

“He stepped out there and kicked some dirt around home plate,” Stratton said. “He’s a player’s manager and he protects us, for sure.”

Alguacil had to sneak back to the dugout to let Stratton know the news, and to call GM Bobby Evans.

Stratton, 25, had a 6.02 ERA in nine starts and long ago lost the shine off his status as a prospect after the Giants selected him 20th overall in the 2012 draft. He’s turned into more of a four-pitch command guy and hasn’t featured the devastating fastball-slider combination that allowed him to break out as a junior at Mississippi State after being undrafted and lightly recruited out of high school.

But Stratton was pitching reliably deep into games for the River Cats, and rested innings is what the Giants need. He also had an eye-opening spring in which he was unscored upon in his first nine Cactus League appearances.

“I felt I showed that I belonged here and I cam compete at this level,” Stratton said of his spring. “I’m ready.”

—

Putting Cain on the DL was a no-brainer unless the Giants thought he could start Wednesday in Atlanta. The team can use days off to skip a No.5 starter the following time through, and Cain would be eligible to be activated when his turn would come up again June 12.

But, as Bochy reminded, the Giants prefer to use days off to give everyone in the rotation the extra day of rest.

It sounds as if Suarez would be the frontrunner to start in Cain’s place at Atlanta, if he’s not needed to pitch in relief before then.

—

The Giants had Brandon Belt (ankle) and Hunter Pence (hamstring) in the original lineup. Then Bruce Bochy made a change, inserting Jarrett Parker in there.

In a bit of an upset, it was Denard Span who got scratched. The center fielder was dealing with a bruised right hip after crashing into the wall while making a catch on Wednesday.

Bruce Bochy didn’t make Span’s hip sound like a major deal.

Pence is starting for the first time in seven games after his hamstring passed the tests. Belt, who sprained his ankle on Wednesday, is also in the lineup after missing one game.

Lineups:

CF Blanco

2B Panik

3B Duffy

C Posey

1B Belt

RF Pence

LF Parker

SS Crawford

LHP Bumgarner

CF Blackmon

SS Story

3B Arenado

RF Gonzalez

1B Reynolds

LF Raburn

2B Adames

C Garneau

RHP Butler

Andrew Baggarly

Andrew Baggarly has documented the most eventful era in San Francisco Giants baseball history, having covered the team since 2004 for th​ree major media outlets including the San Jose Mercury News and the Oakland Tribune​. This is his 20th season as a baseball writer.
​Baggarly is the author of the bestselling book, A Band of Misfits: Tales of the 2010 San Francisco Giants, and the newly published Giant Splash: Bondsian Blasts, World Series Parades and Other Thrilling Moments By the Bay. Baggarly’s other notable life accomplishments include running as the Bratwurst in the Milwaukee Sausage Race and becoming a three-time Jeopardy! champion.

Did Posey run the bases hard enough during his early game Home Run? I just want to make sure his TROT was manly enough for TO or at least I want to know if Buster grimaced enough when he rounded third?

Actually they’ve all done it. It was Miller who had the “Buster Posey’s…good friend Hunter Pence” call. Kuiper called Duffy “Brandon Belt” recently. That’s why I said “it’s contagious”–because it’s funny, not to pick on one guy in particular.

Seems like when we want it overturned and it’s not really clear we don’t get the call. There’s been NUMEROUS challenges this year where there really didn’t seem to be “irrefutable video evidence” and yet they change the call to screw us.

Well, we’ve come out on the right side of some of those, too, but I just don’t like how there seems to no rhyme or reason to it. It’s gotten noticeably worse this year. I really do smell umpire union collusion.

Strange managing there. The Royals had tied it up at 7 and had a runner at 2nd with 2 outs. They intentionally walked the next two guys to load the bases, and after a 10-pitch battle, the winning run was singled in on a 3-2 pitch. I don’t really understand putting two guys on with two outs, moving the winning run to third for free, and putting all that pressure on the pitcher.

Great commercial where some duyfus comes up to him and his truck with his GF and starts yammering about what I nice truck he has and then he kind of taps Bum on his shoulder and Bum looks at him weirdly with GF later saying “That was Madison…..”

I saw the Spanish version last night. They really should’ve bit the bullet & have him speak English with Spanish subtitles. I’m sure audiences would’ve gotten it. As it is, morphing the Spanish phrase into Hodor made no sense whatsoever to Spanish speakers. That’s a shame.

Which just further illustrates a complete lack of foresight. You make a 19-yr old’s first start at home. Period. The fact he’s Mexican and you play in LA makes it a no-brainier. Conjur up Fernando redux.

It goes back to the comments yesterday that the Urias promotion smelled desperate. The Dodgers are on the road playing the Mets and then the Cubs. Meanwhile the Giants have been playing well and have four against the Braves coming up while the Dodgers have four in Wrigley. The Dodgers were hoping that Urias could come in and dazzle people and keep them from falling too far back in the division. I get it, but it’s a little short-sighted in terms of the best interests of this kid.

Funny, I was just thinking about Tim Lincecum scowling on the mound at Coors late in 2010, saying “F–ing juiced ball. That’s bulls**t.” That was when the Giants were involved in HumidorGate with the Rox.

Feel sorry for the Pelicans’ Bryce Dejean-Jones, shot dead this morning. He apparently was trying to break into his baby momma’s apartment at 330 am – it was the wrong apartment and the resident shot him dead when Dejean-Jones kicked the door down. I guess Darwin was at work too.

Making a deadline deal to improve the bullpen not only makes sense for this year, but for the future as well. Romo and Lopez might, and maybe should be gone next season. We’ll see how Romo does when he returns. Picking up Lopez in 2010 turned out to be a great long term move.

Javi has become a major liability. Time to put him on the DL for a rest or some mechanical adjustments and bring up Okert. Either that or only use him against righties. His numbers against lefties are just awful.

I might have let Bum go another inning…and I wouldn’t have pulled Law after one hitter. That was a waste, and it’s silly to bring in Javi to face lefties when he’s been so terrible against them. Bochy overmanaged here, and it’s already cost Bum a win and may cost the team a game.

Yes I am mad at Night Train Lopez and feel for Bum but MLB has to legislate for a baseball park in Denver that is not affected by being almost 6000 ft above sea level.
Build something like ARZ and use modern technology to mitigate the altitude because everybody knows it is a freak show like the lady with five arms

MadBum in the clubhouse: “So, Cory, when you get a bunt sign, just don’t get one down and get to two strikes. Then, pretend you don’t know the take sign and swing away. They’re not going to get mad at you–you’re just a dumb pitcher, right?”

I still hate Coors Field. Went to one game there last season, a Vogey start. Jump out to a 5 run lead– rain delay, and Giants wind up holding on for something like a 14-13 win with the bases loaded for the Rockies when the last out made. Its not baseball– more like pinball

From today’s SF Chronicle in Bruce Jenkins column highlighted our very own “Mavo”

Reader Chris Mavraedis recalled a game against the Dodgers in which Jim Ray Hart was running the bases and got knocked cold by a Maury Wills throw. Willie Mays took over at third base, playing the position for the first and only time of his career.

i was really surprised that you called my comment, and since i wrote it, me, idiotic. i always liked you, loved your musical taste, and appreciate your hard work, posting the interesting things you run across. if you disagree with a comment i make, that’s fine, but idiotic? i apologize to you for my name calling. it was out of line.

I admitted saying what I said. I went back and hit “edit” and replaced what I said with dot-dot-dot.
We have all made comments whereby the comment maybe what is idiotic vs us as people being “idiotic” or “idiots”.

Having coached at a high level for 27 years I have seen bad moments in players sliding and getting their spikes snagged on poorly kept fields thus I knew Belt was in severe pain, plus Wisdom Cow and jumped the shark with his Belt comments. Others were comparing it to the Shawn Estes moment and I was at that game and Estes never slid – he hurt himself going in standing up.